[unrev-II] Anyone know a GOOD mail list server??

From: Eric Armstrong (eric.armstrong@eng.sun.com)
Date: Thu Aug 23 2001 - 15:24:40 PDT

  • Next message: Eric Armstrong: "Re: [unrev-II] Thinking about communicating"

    Ok. I tried. And tried, and tried.

    I set up a mailing list on Yahoo groups thinking, "how hard
    could it be?" The answer has turned out to be "damn near
    impossible". (If anyone has any alternatives to offer, I
    would be glad to hear of them. Or, if anyone is thinking of
    following in my footsteps, the remainder of this message
    might help you avoid the pitfalls I fell into.)

    Oh, it was easy enough to set up the group. But becoming
    *part* of it is another matter. Herewith, a small litany
    of the issues:
      * The help documents talk about "primary" and "alternate"
        email addresses. But there are no fields labeled
        "primary address" anywhere -- only "alternate addresses".

      * It turns out that any address other than a yahoo email
        account is considered an "alternate" email address.

      * So, attempting to use the "alternate" address as the
        home address, and counting on the primary address as
        being your work address, for example, simply doesn't
        work.

      * It therefore appears that you need to sign up twice at
        Yahoo -- once from your own address, and once frok your
        work address.

      * Having created the work, I then found I couldn't send
        a message to it! That may have been because I had set
        my "alternate" address to my home address? Not sure.

      * To be able to send to the list, I had to send myself
        and invitation to join, and reply to it.

      * But now, having joined as a subscriber, I now got two
        copies of my post -- one to myself as owner, and another
        to myself as subscriber.

      * So I deleted myself as subscriber. I was sort of hoping
        that, having "broken the ice", I would now be able to
        send. But no such luck.

      * The only remaining option, it appears, is to add myself
        back as a subscriber, give my subscriber-self all of the
        admin options possible, and delete my owner-self.

      * At the moment, I'm trying to do that. Only it appears
        that attempts to send myself an invitation no longer
        work, probably as a result of having deleted myself!

    God, what a nightmare.

    Finally, I have received no response whatever from Yahoo
    to any messages I have sent, other than the very first. (At
    this point I've sent a round half-dozen or so.)

    In short, the mailing list mechanism appears to be powerful,
    but it is far from intuitive, and their ability to respond
    appears to be painfully underwhelming.

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